Friday Funny- Gavin Schmidt on: Polar Bears, Martha Stewart, and Me

Oh, I found some comedy gold posted on the NASA website What on Earth is That?

It features a talk by NASA GISS warmist Gavin Schmidt, who apparently took a trip to understand that all important metric of the Arctic climate; polar bears. A video of his talk follows. Apparently, Martha Stewart came along for the ride and made a festive thermometer cozy for Gavin.

Gosh, how did he tear himself away from his taxpayer funded blogging duties at Real Climate while he’s still got hundreds of climate reporting stations in Australia that haven’t been updated since 1992 in the GISTEMP database? Good thing he has his priorities straight.

Somebody at NASA writes on that blog:

You just can’t go wrong with a title to a talk like that. The clip below is from an hour-long talk that Gavin Schmidt gave to colleagues at GISS about his visit to Churchill, a tiny town in Canada that’s known as the polar bear capitol of the world. Yes, Martha Stewart came along as well. The talk doesn’t start until about 1:48, and Schmidt’s interview with Stewart starts at 48:18

And here’s the video:

This note is on the video, presumably from Gavin. This video says it has had 35 views so far, so I expect WUWT readers will make up the bulk of the viewership.

Title: Polar bears, Martha Stewart and me

Abstract:

Polar bears are frequently poster children for climate change issues, but until recently I had very little idea of the details of threat posed by continuing Arctic change on their life-cycle. In this presentation I’ll share what I learned on a recent trip along with some other, perhaps more recognisable, New Yorkers, to Churchill, Manitoba

“Polar Bear Capital of the World”!

And, here’s Gavin’s slide show in PDF form:

http://www.giss.nasa.gov/meetings/lunch/2011a/20110209-Gavin_Schmidt.pdf

UPDATE: For those of you that would like some peer reviewed science to help de-gavinify your friends that fear “global warming” will bring on the demise of the polar bear, here’s this from commenter “Jimbo” who writes:

It seems to me that Polar Bears are more robust than previously thought.

and…

This is the perfect thread to show how vulnerable Polar Bears are.

“…a radio-collared adult female polar bear in the Beaufort Sea made a continuous swim of 687 km over 9 days…”

Estimating the Energetic Contribution of Polar Bear (Ursus maritimus) Summer Diets to the Total Energy Budget

The analysis indicated that it is possible for polar bears to maintain their body mass while on shore by feeding on arctic charr and seal blubber. Polar bears of body masses up to 280 kg could gain sufficient energy from blueberries to match the daily energy loss.

http://www.asmjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1644/08-MAMM-A-103R2.1

We describe an observation of a polar bear cub on its mother’s back while the mother was swimming among ice floes in Svalbard, Norwegian Arctic.

http://www.springerlink.com/content/8051204vu73l320w/

Also:

http://www.beartrust.org/Polar_bear.html

and…

Polar Bears Thrive While Arctic Warms Up!

A survey of the animals’ numbers in Canada’s eastern Arctic has revealed that they are thriving, not declining, because of mankind’s interference in the environment.

In the Davis Strait area, a 140,000-square kilometre region, the polar bear population has grown from 850 in the mid-1980s to 2,100 today.

Polar Bear numbers

Polar bears are distributed throughout the Arctic in 19 populations, comprising an estimated total of 20 000–25 000 bears (Marine Mammal Commission, 2006).